Valedictory Address

“Valedictory”(18 May 2000):1-3. (UA Case 68, Box 1)

Your Honour, Mr. Chancellor, Madame President, honoured guests, fellow graduates, faculty and friends,

Of all the great thinkers of the past and present that I could have chosen to quote, I chose Sally Jessy Raphael, a TV talk show host. She was once asked to what she credited all of her talent to… I know, I thought the question was odd too… Sally Jessy Raphael? Talented? Anyway, she replied, “The only real talent is perseverance.”

This really seemed to make sense to me. It said to me that success is not a predetermined thing, nor something that is primarily based on luck, but rather success is a consequence of your determination.

I believe that most everyone understands what it takes to achieve a particular goal. I think we all know how to get from point A to point B, but the real question is, “Do you have the determination to make the necessary sacrifices to achieve your particular goal?”

“Perseverance” may not be an easy task. I think that the perseverance we displayed could be described as a diet. Imagine you are on a diet, a serious diet too, not one of those Miss Piggy Diets where her philosophy is not to eat more than you can lift. Say you are on a serious diet of wanting to lost 10 lbs. You have a pretty good idea of how to lose that, you would probably stick to a no-fat diet, say, eating nothing but celery and carrots. So imagine one day you’re starving and you’re driving down Prospect St., and the first thing you smell, are you with me here? Is that Kentucky Fried Chicken… mmm boyyyy… You know I swear they put something in that chicken so you can smell that stuff from Regent Street. So anyway, you are right before KFC now, and what’s the last thing on your mind? Celery and carrots would be my first guess. But somehow we managed to persevere and resist that temptation and we made it to Smythe St.!

So here we are, we’ve said no to KFC for the last X number of years, and now it’s time for us to be rewarded. I hope you all know that KFC is being used as a metaphor for all the temptations we have denied ourselves over the years so that we could be where we are today.

So now the time has come for us to go and seek out our rewards. We’ve persevered enough and now we want our slice of the pie. Although we have enjoyed our time here at UNB, I’m pretty sure we are all excited to be moving on.

I’ve head a lot of people saying that they were scared of now having to enter the outside world, the real world it’s called, maybe you’ve heard of it. It’s a deep dark place where it’s hard to get ahead. It’s hard to find employment and then to keep it. I’ve often heard that it’s not a fun place, but one filled with more deadlines and more bills and more pressure than you can imagine.

BUT fret not my brothers and sisters, this deep dark place is not so bad. (I once visited it.). Over the years we have acquired a new number of skills that will help us out in this new place. We are able to gather free Tupperware, shaving cream, T-shirts and yes even maxi pads just by filling out fake credit card applications. We can now flick beer caps with amazing accuracy and speed. (Which we WILL find a practical use for it one of these days, I swear.) We are able to survive on nothing but Kraft dinner for weeks at a time and love every bite of it!

But seriously now though, my classmates and I have discussed in the past that it is not only the direct knowledge that we have obtained from our degree that has educated us, but rather that we each have developed efficient methods to teach ourselves. Sometimes some professors gave us no choice but for us to learn the material on our own. But that was not a bad thing, difficult? Yes. Bad? No.

So, I now believe that armed with our new arsenal of knowledge and skills that we can handle this new scary place, and in fact I firmly believe that we will eventually conquer this great new world of ours.

One more thing before I finish up. I know on that degree there is only one name, and it is highly deserving of that honour, but I know for myself, that my degree was a conglomerate effort. I received a lot of help from professors, well, some professors. I received an immense amount of support from my family and last but not least my classmates. Be sure to thank these people before this day is over because our journey would have been much more difficult without their support.

I wish you all the best of luck in your future endeavors wherever they may be. I firmly believe that if we stick to the principles that we have developed here, they will enable us to succeed wherever that we may end up. Thank you.